Just how safe do you think New Yorkers would be if the mayor and police commissioner no longer ran the NYPD, but instead control was handed to . . . the City Council?

Better stop laughing: New York’s Clown College, which tries to pass itself off as a legislative body, wants just that.

The thought should send shivers down every New Yorker’s back.

During a nearly six-hour sideshow last week, power-hungry councilmembers took up legislation that would, in effect, replace Police Commissioner Ray Kelly with the council itself.

Four bills in particular are meant to thwart the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk program for clearing guns from the street.

Among the bright ideas: forcing cops to get proof of consent before performing even a cursory search. Thugs would just love it: their own Bill of Rights to hide weapons.

To no surprise, the hearing quickly devolved into a shouting match over race and racism. Councilwoman Helen Foster ripped Public Safety Committee Chairman Peter Vallone for defending the NYPD while white.

“If his father,” she huffed, “were . . . being pulled over and called ‘boy’ and fitting a description, then it would be different.”

No one condones racist language; but would Foster prefer if cops didn’t stop Vallone’s father if he fit a description of a crime suspect — just because he was black?

That’s surely a recipe to boost crime.

And, by the way, if she thinks blacks don’t support stop-and-frisk, she needs to talk to any parent of a black kid who’s been shot by an illegal gun. Pronto.

Meanwhile, a bill from Brooklyn Councilmen Jumaane Williams and Brad Lander could do huge harm, by creating an inspector general for the NYPD and essentially dictating Police Department policy.

For 10 years, Kelly and Mayor Bloomberg have set policies that have helped keep New York the safest big city in America, creating an intelligence unit to monitor terror threats and employing stop-and-frisks effectively.

The results: record-low crime and no successful terror attacks.

The council would end these policies.

True, the IG would be appointed by the mayor, and Lander told The Post that “in no case do we envision someone who is setting policy.”

But don’t buy it. The IG post would be politically charged from the start; the appointee would hold no legitimacy in the eyes of the council and the racial-grievance lobby unless it did their bidding.

Besides, the NYPD already has enough watchdogs. As Kelly said: “There are five district attorneys . . . all of them with their own anti-corruption prosecutors. We have two US attorneys; we have the [Commission] to Combat Police Corruption” and the Civilian Complaint Review Board.

Plus, there are more than 1,000 people in the NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau and similar units — one for every 35 members of the department. One thousand people — that’s the size of Newark’s entire police force.

No, it’s not oversight the council wants — it’s outright control of NYPD policy.

The council would have the IG criminalize policy differences. Indeed, his only beat would be political investigations.

Bloomberg knows the stakes. “I think if you want to bring crime back, let’s go politicize control of the Police Department,” he said. “You won’t be safe anymore.”

That’s just what New Yorkers can look forward to if this power grab becomes law.